


Ghosts in These Halls

by jaysayheyyy



Category: Steam Powered Giraffe
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-28
Updated: 2020-04-28
Packaged: 2021-03-01 17:34:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,334
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23900905
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaysayheyyy/pseuds/jaysayheyyy
Summary: It would have made sense for her to go first.
Comments: 10
Kudos: 26





	Ghosts in These Halls

**Author's Note:**

> Lots of sadness ahead, be warned.

Rabbit was supposed to go first. That’s how it goes, isn’t it? The oldest one dies first. It only made sense; she was all rusted joints and stripped gears, falling apart at the seams and barely able to function normally. She was supposed to die first, and then everyone else could follow. That was how she expected it, had dreamt on lonely nights, had put together all the ways she might go and what to say when she did. How to tell her family she loved them so very dearly and that they shouldn’t be afraid or sad because this is just life. All those words she’d rehearsed left her and left her speechless as one by one, her family faded away. Michael. Steve. Hatchworth. Upgrade. Zero. The Jon. The Spine. Gone, turned cold in her desperate grasp, the light flickering out from their eyes. Some of them smiled. Some of them cried. Some just waited, oh so patient. Knowing that they were already gone, waiting for their soul to slip away. 

Rabbit was supposed to go first, and yet here she was, still alive and kicking. It wasn’t fair; how dare the world make her watch them all go? How dare it take away the people she’d held close to her heart? For a while there was only anger. She tore apart the manor in her fury, shattering vases, tearing down pictures and breaking frames, throwing the silverware from the drawers because no one needed it now, no one was there to use it. She threw couch cushions and ripped apart blankets until she was left in the wreckage of her home, spilling tears onto the carpet beneath her feet. For a moment there had been such blissful silence, but then she’d really started looking, and found the devastation hitting her like a tidal wave. 

She’d ruined it, left all the precious things her family had left behind in broken pieces. Michael’s favorite blanket. The cushion Steve spilt coffee on once and never told anyone. Jon’s favorite picture of some flowers long dead. Zero’s drawing of ice cream. The spoon Upgrade had bent beyond help long ago. The vase Hatchworth had proudly declared his own when he returned from flower picking. Spine’s cookware. All of it ruined by her hands, her cloudy mind. Rabbit buried her face in her hands, sobbing wretchedly, her shoulders trembling with the weight everyone had left behind. Never before had she felt such a longing, a hole in her heart gnawing at what little was left. 

“It’s okay, Rabbit.” She heard, and froze, still trembling from head to toe. 

“. . . Zero?” She called, scrubbing her tears, but as she looked around, there was no one there. Her shoulders slumped. There was no way she was alone-- his voice had been crystal clear, right next to her! If she just closed her eyes she could feel him beside her, his hand on her shoulder, but as she whipped around to look nothing but destruction stared back at her. “Am I goin’ crazy?” She wondered aloud, her voice no louder than a broken whisper. She sniffled. “Can robuts be crazy, eh, Jon?” She quoted herself, and breathed a very heavy sigh. She knelt down with a wince at her screeching joints and began the arduous process of picking up the mess she’d made.

If she had just looked a moment longer, maybe she would have seen him standing there, Zero at his side as they helplessly watched their sister mourn. 

Some days it was anger. Some days it was deep depression. Today was another day of dragging herself down the halls, trying to hold herself together and finding herself unsuccessful. Onwards she trudged, passing pictures that had managed to escape her fury. It felt as though they were staring holes into her back, all smiles and laughter captured in glass cages unwilling to let go. Moments she’d taken for granted all staring back at her. She looked up, those eyes too strong for her to ignore, and gasped sharply as she saw Upgrade standing there. She fumbled for words, something to say to catch the bot’s attention, but as soon as Rabbit blinked. . . Upgrade was gone. Her heart sank.

She stumbled towards where she’d seen the girl and looked around wildly, catching a glimpse of a dark skirt just around the corner. So she gave desperate chase, searching for little glimpses of Upgrade, calling her name over and over. Down the twisting halls she sprinted. She knocked over a painting in her haste, but her mind was clouded by her objective of catching her younger sister. It felt like a game of tag, almost, except Rabbit was desperate to catch Upgrade, exerting far too much energy to be safe. 

Rabbit followed as best as she could, until her foot caught on the carpet and she fell in a dazed heap. Her systems warned her of her jarred mind, reminding her of her rusting metal now easily broken. Rabbit laid there, staring at the bright lights of the ceiling. She let out a pained whine of grief and put her arm over her eyes, trying to block out reality. It wasn’t fair; how could her siblings just appear like that, only to leave her all alone again?

“Upgrade. . .” She whimpered, ignoring the oily tears cascading down her cheeks, “I mi-mi-mi-miss you.” Rabbit did not get up from her spot, nor did she remove her arm from her eyes. She didn’t think she could move-- not for a while, anyway. Hopefully the floor would eat her up and whisk her away from this living nightmare. Maybe she’d get to go home; home didn’t feel like the manor, not anymore. Home felt like her family.

Had she only opened her eyes, she would have seen Upgrade standing over her solemnly, Upgrade’s hands clasped over her heart as she silently begged her sister to get up.

It wasn’t often she visited the workshop nowadays, but she needed to change her oil. In fact, it really should’ve been changed days ago, but apathy struck and sunk its fangs into her, sending its venom through her wire veins. Today she had woken moderately okay, and so she rose with purpose, intending on doing at least this. Down the stairs she struggled, terrified to fall and shatter like a porcelain doll, until she was finally able to push open the creaky door of the workshop. She flicked on the lights, frowning as they took a moment to flicker into life. If they went out, Rabbit would not be able to fix them. Not without help, but everyone was gone. There was no one 

She swallowed the rising grief and stubbornly ignored all of Michael and Steve’s gear, only halting when she saw a familiar pair of red-tinted goggles abandoned beside a black bandanna. Pappy’s goggles had their place on her hat, but Rabbit couldn’t help but take the bandanna and tie it around her neck, fastening the goggles atop the cloth. She would keep them near her heart. These were all she had left of her favorite humans. Rabbit grabbed the oil can with shaky hands, brows furrowing in focus. But a clang to her right startled her into the dropping the precious liquid, letting out a loud curse. 

She looked over in curiosity, instinctively moving to speak to whoever was there, when she stopped in her tracks. There was Michael, hand outstretched for some tool, and at his side was Steve, arms crossed. He looked mid conversation with Michael, though from the commotion of the tools dropping to the floor, he had paused and looked Rabbit’s way. Rabbit stared at them in mute shock, before her feet started to carry her their way. But of course, she blinked, and they were gone, dissipated like fog. But the tools-- the tools were still all spilt on the ground. Screws and bolts and various wrenches all scattered across the floor, too far away for Rabbit to have possibly done it. She knelt before the mess with trembling hands, reaching out as oil welled up in her eyes. It was thick and coagulated, long overdue for the change she’d tried to give herself. 

But her oil went ignored as she gathered the spilled tools into her hands and very carefully put them back in the little container that had been knocked over, excessive amounts of steam hissing from her vents. Her body was breaking apart by the day, and the ghosts of the men who would have been able to fix her were haunting her, taunting her with flickers into reality only to disappear moments later. Was this some kind of cosmic joke? 

“It ain’t funny.” Rabbit spat aloud, struggling to her feet with the box cradled in her arms. Her fingers twitched as her frayed wiring briefly malfunctioned, electricity flowing in the wrong directions for a second. A pained gasp escaped her as she hastily put the box back on the table, leaning against the nearest solid surface as she manually redirected the flow with a quick reset of her circuitry. She hiccuped, scrubbing at her tears with the back of her hand. Oil smeared across her pale cheeks and dripped down her chin, but she couldn’t care less. “Tau-Tau-Tau-Tauntin’ a girl who’s al-al-al-already all by herself.” She scoffed, grabbing a new can of oil as she went back to her workbench. She made sure to frustratedly kick the old, spilt can, somewhat satisfied to watch it skitter across the floor and spread more oil. 

With her back turned on the ghosts watching her, Rabbit changed her oil in silence. She tried not to think about the fact that the amount of times she’d done it herself were rapidly beginning to outnumber the times she’d had a helping hand.

On the days she was certain she wouldn’t end up caught in the rain, Rabbit liked to go and visit the garden. She didn’t maintain it, not with her old metal bones and exhausted body, but it stopped needing care a long time ago. The plants had grown wild, fighting over the other for dominance in an ironically beautiful manner. Flowers tangled around the other as if they were trying to choke their enemies out, but it always looked like the colors were peacefully mingling to the untrained eye. Beautiful war seemed like an oxymoron to Rabbit, but she still came to sit amongst the flowers regardless. 

Besides, the sun always felt nice on her skin. Her metal grew warm under the gentle rays, her hair gently tousled by the breeze as the wind toyed with her purple locks, free to greet her and fly away. These days were good, or as good as they could be when she had no one to spend them with. Sometimes she spent her time wading through memories, lost to the world until the cold of night pricked at her sensors in reminder of time. Other times, like today, she simply watched the world spin around her. The wildlife had long since grown used to her; no longer did the birds fly away in fear when her loud, whirring body grew closer. The squirrels still frolicked amongst the tall stalks of vibrant grass, chasing each other up trees and through the branches. 

In some ways, she had them as company. They staved off the loneliness for a while, even if the small animals always kept their polite distance. Maybe they could feel the raw grief washing off her in waves. Maybe they knew her time was coming soon, felt the stench of death following her, its shadowy figure looming behind her ever so patiently. Or maybe they were just dumb little creatures afraid of the big, clunky robot with the motor control of a toddler. Whatever it was, Rabbit was still distant from the world around her, and maybe that was worse than being alone. She was surrounded by all these living things and yet none of them wanted anything to do with her. 

Sat on the bench, it came to no surprise to the very tired automaton that she caught the sight of orange and brass in the corner of her eye. She breathed a sigh, folding her hands in her lap as she kept her eyes steadily forward. The sun shone in the blue sky with not a cloud in sight, watching over the earth peacefully. She kept her eyes on the leaves, straining to hear the ‘swish’ of leaves rustled in the wind. If she looked, Hatchworth would disappear. If she looked, she’d know for sure he was there. But he’d leave her. So what if she ended up talking to the empty air? Whoever was watching probably thought her crazy already, and whoever might stumble across her would quickly catch on. Nothing mattered anymore. 

“You used ta pi-pi-pi-pi-pick flowers here.” Rabbit spoke aloud, absently tightening a screw on her neck. Eventually it’d just fall out and she wouldn’t be able to recover it as she was, and then her stutters would be even worse than before. What did it matter? She thought despondently, feeling the weight on her shoulders only grow heavier with every passing thought. “When you fi-fi-fi-first came along, Pa-Pa-Pa-Pappy used ta hafta drag y-y-y-you outta the garden.” Rabbit swallowed, feeling an odd tightness in her chest. “‘Cause, cause you. . .” She sniffled, trying to hold back the tears. “You’d pi-pi-pick too ma-ma-ma-many. Ruin the soil.” She breathed a wet laugh, looking down at her hands. Tracing every little scratch in the metal, her thumb running over the rust and patina. “Maybe you’re no-no-n-no-not here.” She murmured, “But I hope you know I miss you.” 

She looked over, and there was nothing there. 

With a shaky breath, Rabbit heaved herself off the bench. It took her a moment to gather the energy, her boiler low on water as it usually was nowadays, but she stood on stiff, rusting legs and turned her back on the bench, leaving the garden behind for the sun to set and envelop the land in darkness. If she had just stopped and let her hope spark back to life, maybe she would have seen the bundle of orange flowers gently fall onto the bench just beside where she’d sat.

She used to be scared to sleep. Back when she first realized she was breaking down, she came to also realize that it meant her systems could fail at any time, and what was scarier than expecting to wake up and never leaving sleep’s grasp? To simply stop was terrifying to her. How could someone who had lived years and years just end in seconds? The idea was too much on her already fragmented psyche, and so she avoided sleep for a while. It ended disastrously, as one would expect. One destructive mental breakdown, an arm that would never be fixed and a lesson learned later, Rabbit decided it would be better to sleep and face that fear every night than to ever experience that again.

Nowadays, she never really meant to avoid it, but sleep evaded her. It was slippery and escaped her many a night, far more often with every passing day. Tonight was one of those nights. On nights like these, she wandered. She never really stopped to think about where she went, just walked until her body dragged her down into stasis, but tonight was different. Tonight the manor in its endless oddities and ever shifting corridors led her to a place she hadn’t visited in years; the music hall. Playing music felt wrong now, and she’d stopped forever ago, so she couldn’t understand why she’d been led here. 

“Gettin’ antsy with the quiet?” Rabbit asked the halls, which she knew had no answers for her. The manor was strange like that. Always changing, seemed to have a mind of its own, but never communicated in a way that made sense. Rabbit shrugged, standing at the double doors that would lead her backstage in conflict. She hated coming back here, struck by the memories of concerts and rehearsals still fresh in her head as the day they happened. Every time she looked back it felt like getting hit by a train of nostalgia and endless amounts of grief. Wasn’t it just yesterday that she was performing with Zero and Spine? Hadn’t Jon and Upgrade accidentally brought down the curtains minutes ago? Steve was supposed to be checking sound with the AI, yet they were silent as stones. They’d gone off the grid after Steve and Zero died. Rabbit knew it well; she checked every damn day, desperate for some sort of interaction or intelligent contact, but Beebop and QWERTY had just. . . left. Maybe they died, too. 

Even with her hesitation, Rabbit found herself stepping backstage anyway, her boiler stalling at the sight of dusty instruments strewn about. They were neatly put away, but neat to the Walter automatons meant something like “they’re on the stands but they’re literally everywhere”. A short, bitter laugh escaped her. Even after death her siblings still annoyed her. With a heavy sigh, she let her fingers run across the random assortments of instruments, halting at the sight of Spine’s old guitar. It’d been decades since she’d played any music, much less considered trying once more. But she was nearing her end, this she knew in her very soul, and it wouldn’t hurt to give it a go. Play some acoustic stuff, lay the instrument to rest in a way she’d never been able to do for her brother. 

She carefully grabbed the guitar and brushed the curtains aside as she walked on stage, settling the guitar in her hands with the strap comfortably resting across her shoulders and back. For a moment she stood there, phantom cheers of a crowd long gone echoing in her head. If she just closed her eyes she could see her siblings standing beside her, geared up for another exciting show. But when she opened them there was nothing but stagnant air around her. Rabbit sat herself on the edge of the stage, aimlessly kicking her feet with satisfying ‘thunk’s against the wooden stage. Her legs sometimes locked up and took a while to loosen, as proven by the fact that one of her legs refused to kick after a few swings, so she settled as comfortably as she could and tuned the guitar. 

It took her longer than usual, and she had to wrack her brain to remember the correct notes and how they sounded, but she was pleased to find that her skill hadn’t deteriorated as much as she thought. For a while she sat there and strummed familiar songs, but she didn’t sing along. Playing was one thing. But singing-- singing when no one was there to sing with her, that felt wrong. Spine should’ve been at her side with the same quirked grin that Pappy had always flaunted. Zero should have been cracking jokes with ease. She hummed in deep thought, tapping her palm against the strings to stop the music. 

“I made it this far.” Rabbit mused aloud, staring out at the empty seats. Her eyes lingered on the sound booth that Steve should have been sat in, missing his grin and his thumbs up as he gave her the go-ahead. “Ma-Ma-Ma-May as well, huh?” Rabbit took a shaky breath and hummed a bit, closing her eyes as she fell into the familiar haze of singing. Her focus narrowed to the words building up on her tongue, the first chords of Honeybee ringing in the air. 

Maybe it was crazy, but she couldn’t help but think that she could hear a familiar baritone voice joining in. As she stopped to look, though, the noise faded away, leaving her singing a song best sung with three. Her voice petered out and silence prevailed once more. She tugged her hat over her eyes and tried to steady her overheating boiler, tucking her chin down towards her chest. Wordlessly, she unwound herself from the guitar strap, set it down on the stage, and slipped offstage. 

As it had been with everyone else, if she had only looked, she would have seen him standing on stage with his hat clutched in shaking hands. 

“You know,” Rabbit spoke aloud as she shrugged on her coat, uncaring of how insane she sounded, talking to the air, “I was sp’sd to go fi-fi-first.” It felt strange to utter it aloud. Almost childish, really, like she was a little kid arguing about her turn in a game. Rabbit fluffed up her hair and adjusted her hat, slick tears already streaming down her cheeks. It took her a few tries to turn the doorknob, her hands not working quite right, but once she did she carefully shut the door behind her. The click felt final, loud even with her swirling vortex of rampant thoughts. “I’m the oldest. I was bui-bui-bui-bui-built first.” She went to tighten the screw on her neck, but it was gone. Huh. 

Her feet carried her down the worn path of stones that used to be paper white, boots tapping against the solid surface. She let her fingertips graze the soft edges of flower petals, dancing around thorns. “I knew that people wou-wou-wou-would come ‘n go.” She passed the bench without a glance at the flowers left there. “Pappy did. Ma d-d-d-d-did.” Her pitch warbled as her systems lost stability. She needed fresh oil. She also needed water. She did not turn back to retrieve either of those. “Guess I ne-ne-never thought I’d be the last one standin’.” She remarked, pushing aside unruly plants blocking her way to finally reach the clearing where the duck pond still sat, peaceful as it had been the day Pappy brought her there all the way back in 1896. 

Rabbit smiled shakily, seating herself on the worn bench. It creaked ominously, but held faithfully. She withdrew the bag of oats she’d gathered for the ducks, her old friends she’d almost forgotten in her grief, and began to feed them. She used to do it with Pappy, but then he passed, so she started bringing Ma along. Then Ma went, and the pond became Rabbit’s place to escape to when the world got too chaotic. Now she wished she’d shown more people her little haven. She wished she’d done alot of things differently, looking back. But there were also a million things she wouldn’t change for the world. 

Rabbit leaned back and watched the ducks eagerly snack on her parting gifts, her lids feeling heavy. She hummed to herself, Honeybee somehow sneaking into her song. Honeybee, however repetitive it grew after a thousand shows she spent playing it, was her favorite. Not because she wrote it, or because it reminded her of days long passed; no, Honeybee was her favorite because she’d sang it with everyone at least once. It started busking with Spine, Jon, and Upgrade. Then Upgrade and Jon stepped away from the band, but Hatchworth eagerly hopped in and sang with her and Spine. Then Hatchworth decided he wanted to try something new, and Zero stepped up to the plate. Even Michael and Steve had sung it, whether it was in the kitchen while they were cooking, or filling in for harmonies during rehearsal.

Honeybee reminded her of her family. A family she’d lost a long time ago, helplessly watching as they fell one by one like dominos. Humans were fragile and went quick. Robots rusted away slower. Both absences hurt deep in her core, piercing her soul with knives that would never slip away. Not while she was still holding onto them tight. Rabbit couldn’t let go of the people she lost, but soon it wouldn’t matter. Her head tilted upwards to peer at the shining sun through the branches. It looked like the light at the end of the tunnel everyone spoke of, she thought, and let her eyes shut for the very last time. 

There was someone holding her hand. Which was absurd, she thought, rousing from sleep groggily. Awareness came to her slowly. First was the feeling of that someone squeezing her hand. Then came other sensations; the cool breeze, the kind sun, someone pressed against her side, the vibrations of his chest as he quietly spoke tickling her. Then came noise. She heard a familiar baritone voice to her right, followed by a lilting voice in the distance. There were soft voices to her left conversing about something she couldn’t quite catch. People were laughing in the distance. The wilderness was alive with birds chirping happily and squirrels playing in the trees. Carefully, still tired from some lingering sensation, Rabbit opened her eyes. 

It took her a moment to focus her optics, blinking to reset her depth perception. But when she did she found herself dumbstruck. She was still beside the pond, but at the shoreline she saw a man with blonde curls against golden skin sat next to a man with dreadlocks pulled back into a ponytail with mismatched gold and silver plating, both of them animatedly gesturing in conversation. Beside them was a bot with metallic pink skin feeding the ducks from her palm. Further away from the shore, sat in the grass, she could see two human men sat around a pile of miscellaneous gears and technology as they tinkered, seemingly holding a partially distracted conversation between them. Hatchworth was off in the distance collecting flowers.

Reeling in disbelief, Rabbit looked up and to her right, a strangled gasp escaping her. Spine smiled down at her, his emerald eyes twinkling with joy. Rabbit stared at him for a moment, at a loss. Then she looked to her left, her gears momentarily stalling as she saw Ma and Pappy grinning back at her. 

“You’re here.” Rabbit breathed. “You’re all here.” Pappy squeezed her hand again, nodding with a small sniffle. Tears wet his eyes. Ma pat his shoulder consolingly.

“Welcome home, Rabbit. We missed you very much.”


End file.
